


Prescribe Not Us Our Duties

by voleuse



Category: Peter Pan - Fandom
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-11-05
Updated: 2009-11-05
Packaged: 2017-10-04 01:49:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 422
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24642
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/voleuse/pseuds/voleuse
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><em>No more! The text is foolish.</em></p>
            </blockquote>





	Prescribe Not Us Our Duties

**Author's Note:**

> No spoilers for anything, really. Title and summary adapted from Shakespeare's _King Lear_.

The forest called out to Wendy, whispered to her in the middle of the night. She pushed aside the furs that made her bedroll, and wrapped the blanket around her shoulders like a cloak. She stepped out of the hut they'd made her own, and crept out to the room littered with the boys, snoring softly, kicking against their blankets. She bent, brushed a hand against John's forehead, then Michael's. Michael's hair was in need of a trim, she observed.

For a long moment, she was trapped in her affections, then an owl hooted and the spell broke.

Wendy glided out of the warren of rooms and into the forest's deepness, where the moonlight slipped through the canopy of branches to dapple against the leaves and soil underfoot. Wendy took one step, and then another. She breathed deep, and she smiled, and she ran. The blanket billowed behind her, snapping at her speed, and she leapt over gnarled roots, her feet skimming over stones as they rolled at her steps. She thought, if she wanted it enough, she could fly.

As the trees thinned, she slowed her pace, took great gulps of the air. Before her, there was a hill, and when she climbed it, she found herself surveying the ocean waves, darkened by night.

She'd never had opportunity to just _listen_ to waves lapping against stone. She folded onto the ground and wrapped her arms around her knees. She listened.

"She sings."

Wendy twisted her head, rested her cheek against her leg as she watched Tiger Lily approach. She smiled. "She does," she replied. "I'd not heard it before."

Tiger Lily knelt next to Wendy, the movement as graceful as snowfall. Wendy admired the way Tiger Lily's fingers curled into each other, curving to an almond's shape. "When the moon is full," Tiger Lily said, "the ocean can teach us about," she paused, her lips parting for a moment. "About the outside. There." Her hands parted, and she raised them, palms up.

Wendy followed the line cast by the gesture, and if she looked far enough into the horizon, she could almost see--

"Tiger Lily," she said, "why is Peter the only one who can fly?"

Tiger Lily lowered her hands, rested them on her knees again, separately. The corners of her mouth curved, and Wendy watched joy wash over her face.

"He is not," she said. She rose to her feet and extended her hand.

Wendy took it, and together, they ran to the edge of the ocean and jumped.


End file.
